Overview
The Programming division is responsible for organizing the part of the schedule focused on hour-long-scale sessions: panel discussions, workshops, demonstrations, lectures and the like.
Programming's main responsibilities are to recruit program participants, to pair the participants with ideas submitted from outside or generated by internal brainstorming, to create and maintain a weekend-long schedule and to communicate that schedule to the participants, the Publications division, the GoH? Liaison and all other departments. At con, Programming distributes packets to participants, staffs a solutions center (named the Program Nexus this year) for handling expected and unexpected occurrences, and monitors volunteers for A/V equipment and for counting panel attendance.
The Programming division head's responsibilities are to coordinate these activities and to recruit staff to assist, to establish the broad framework of tracks and of the schedule as a whole, and to communicate with other divisions for scheduling and thematic purposes.
Staff
Programming has the following staff requirements:
- 1 or 2 division heads, 1 or more direct assistants
- Up to 1 track head per program track (set of similar-themed sessions) to head up brainstorming and recruiting program participants in that area
- Several people to staff the Program Nexus at con
- At least 2 people to work Programming's A/V requirements at con
- Developers for Programming's internal software needs (ZAMBIA)
- Volunteers for brainstorming, editing the precis, mail merges and mailing parties
- Volunteers at-con for counting heads, maintaining signage, and moving furniture and props
Timeline
Programming has the following ideal timeline:
- May 15: Brainstorming kickoff meeting.
- July 1: Brainstorming switches from gathering ideas to winnowing them and writing full descriptions.
- July 15: A mass mailing (e-mail followed by postal) questionnaire is sent out to create the participant list, due Sept 15.
- Sept 1: Program precis is being edited.
- Oct 1: Programming precis is sent to prospective participants (due back Nov 1) and is posted to Arisia web site.
- Nov 1: Scheduling begins.
- Nov 15: Dry run of data extracts for Publications and for hotel resume are ready.
- Dec 1: Schedule is sent to participants for comment, posted to web site. Data extract for hotel resume is ready.
- Dec 15: Changes from participant comments incorporated into schedule, web site updated. Final data extract for Publications is ready.
- Jan 1: Drop dead date for any schedule changes before con.